


A Friend for Miss Spider

by straydog733



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: A Guest for Mr. Spider, But with references to S3, Gen, Set during S1, Web!Martin, formative spider book experiences for everyone!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-02
Packaged: 2019-12-31 23:12:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18323879
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/straydog733/pseuds/straydog733
Summary: Statement of Martin Blackwood, concerning his childhood experiences with a book about spiders.





	A Friend for Miss Spider

**Author's Note:**

> Nothing like writing my first fic in three years. I have a lot of feelings about Web!Martin, so hopefully this appeals to someone else as well.

_*click*_

Um, okay. Okay, this is on, all set, soooo...statement of Martin Blackwood, regarding a book from my- uh, from his- childhood. Given directly by subject, March 20th, 2016.

So Jon might be a bit upset that I’m not giving this statement to him. But I also know I really don’t want to bother him with this if I’m wrong, he would not like that. I was so young when it happened, like four or five, so I can’t guarantee how much I’m remembering right and how much is mixed in with everything I’ve been working with around here. It would be really stupid if he looked into it and it was all just me forgetting childhood memories.

But I really think I’m right about the bookplate. I was working on research about Mr. Swain’s case and one of the old files had a photo of what the bookplates for the Leitners look like, and I’m almost positive I’ve seen it before. Well, mostly positive. No positive enough to tell Jon, but...positive enough for this. Just in case.

Like I said, I was maybe four or five, and I already knew that I liked spiders. My grandmother’s house always had these big ones up in the corners and I just loved to look at them while all the adults were busy. I don’t really have any cousins my age, the couple cousins I do have were in their late teens by that point, so I was the only kid around and I spent a lot of time watching those spiders. My mum thought it was creepy, said to my grandma I was going to turn out weird, but my- uh, my dad said it was fine. Normal for a kid to be fascinated by things like spiders. I’m pretty sure he was the one who got me the book. I can’t see how my mum would have.

I don’t think it was for a birthday present or anything, I’m pretty sure he had just seen it in a secondhand shop and thought I would like it. I was getting into books around that time; I was a pretty early reader, but not like prodigy early or anything, so it was a board book. The back had an illustration of a big spider, huge and black with legs sticking out at all angles. I thought you weren’t supposed to draw spiders like that, I always made their legs nice and symmetrical when I drew them, but I thought it was pretty cute how it had a little purple bonnet on top of its head, with a bright red flower. The cover didn’t have any drawings other than some webs at the corners, and the title: _A Friend for Miss Spider_. I thought it looked like a great book. I was happy to get it from my dad.

There was a bookplate on the inside cover, and I’m almost certain it was the one I saw in those archived pictures, but I never really cared about that part. I already loved my new book and jumped straight into reading it. The book started with a couple pages of Miss Spider alone in her house, facing away from the reader. There was one door in the middle of a room and she’s facing it, with her legs going out at all angles. Tables were on either side of the door, and a little pot of droopy flowers was on one of them. For a couple of pages there’s no words, just her legs moving. Then on page five, the first words. “KNOCK KNOCK.”

“IS THAT ONE OF YOUR FRIENDS, MISS SPIDER?” the next page said. I remember that very clearly, because I thought it was kind of nice, you know? Like this spider had so many friends that any one of them could have been knocking on the door. On the next page, there’s a big fly in the open doorway, wearing a shirt and jeans. He looks scared, but he’s holding a big slice of cake out to Miss Spider. “IT’S MR. BLOW, AND HE’S BROUGHT YOU A CAKE.” There’s a close-up of the cake and it looks like the tastiest cake you’ve ever seen, all chocolaty with a cherry on top. “MISS SPIDER LOVES THE CAKE,” it said underneath the drawing. “MR. BLOW SHOULD JOIN THE PARTY.”

On the next page, Miss Spider is facing the door. It’s closed again, but Mr. Blow is in the room now. And while Miss Spider is looking away, Mr. Blow is looking straight out of the book, straight at you. His cake is sitting on the table and he’s smiling really, really wide, and it looks like he’s enjoying the party. Except his eyes always looked...a bit wrong. Like they were open a little too wide and looking straight at you. He stays there on the next page, still looking, when the door goes “KNOCK KNOCK” again. “WHO IS IT, MISS SPIDER?”

This fly is wearing a sundress and holding a bouquet, but she looks angry. “IT’S MRS. GAD, AND SHE’S BROUGHT YOU SOME FLOWERS”. The flowers get their own close-up and they’re beautiful, all bright and yellow, they reminded me of the daffodils that mum would grow in the garden before she got sick. “MISS SPIDER LOVES THE FLOWERS. MRS. GAD SHOULD JOIN THE PARTY.”

On the next page, Mrs. Gad is next to Mr. Blow and they’re both looking at you, both smiling. Most of the bouquet is on the table, but one daffodil is on Miss Spider’s bonnet along with the red flower. Her legs are still moving everywhere, but she doesn’t look at you. The flies do, but you never get to see her face. I remember that made me sad, as a kid, but I didn’t really know why. The door knocks again. “KNOCK KNOCK. WHO IS IT, MISS SPIDER?”

The last fly to come in is wearing some kind of uniform, and has his hand on his son’s shoulder, a smaller fly standing next to him. “IT’S MR. TSETSE AND HE’S BROUGHT YOU HIS SON.” The fly looks...well, it was an illustration, it was hard to tell too much, but the fly looked worried but...ready, if that makes sense? Like this was some chore he had to do. On the close-up page, the little fly has stepped forward through the door, and he looks ready too. And from the corner of the page, one of Miss Spider’s legs has reached down and onto his shoulder. “HE SHOULD JOIN THE PARTY. MR. TSETSE TOO,” the text below says. “EVERYONE SHOULD JOIN THE PARTY.”

Mr. Tsetse and his son are with the other two flies on the next page, but they’re not the only new ones. Miss Spider is still there, still facing away, but dozens of- of little spiders are there too. Not only tiny ones, though, all sorts of sizes, except that Miss Spider is the biggest of all. They all face the reader, sets of eight eyes and wide smiles shining from every spot of the page. And with all the black from their bodies, you can tell that there are little pale lines crossing over everyone, little strings of web connecting the flies, the little spiders, the flowers, the cake, everything. All coming back to Miss Spider. “MISS SPIDER HAS INVITED HER FAMILY,” it says. “MISS SPIDER HAS INVITED HER FRIENDS. BUT MISS SPIDER ALWAYS WANTS MORE FRIENDS. MISS SPIDER LOVES ALL THE PEOPLE WHO KNOCK.”

The next page is just of Miss Spider’s head, but you can still see all the threads coming out from her. She’s faced away but- but turned slightly, her hat is at an angle and you can see the corner of an eye. The next page she’s turned a bit more. The one after that, a bit more. It takes her eight pages to turn around, but finally Miss Spider is looking right out you, looking right at me and smiling. Her smile isn’t wide and grinning like the flies, but soft, somehow. 

I know that sounds silly to say about a spider, even a kid’s book drawing of a spider, but I always loved that page. Out of that whole book, that was my favorite page, one I could draw from memory right now if I tried. Her smile was soft, and gentle and...and the sort of smile that made you feel like you weren’t alone. She looked beautiful. She looked like home. “MISS SPIDER WOULD LIKE TO BE YOUR FRIEND.” 

The next page didn’t have her face anymore, but her hand. One of her legs ended in a sharp black hand with long fingers, held out with the palm up, like you would to give a pet a treat. Or to beckon a child somewhere. The words below it were smaller than the rest in the book, like they were being whispered to you, like you had to lean closer to read them. “WOULD YOU LIKE TO COME TO THE PARTY?” it said. And I remember, I didn’t have to look at that page nearly as long as I had the last one, but I needed to touch it. I put my fingers over the drawing of Miss Spider’s hand and…

Now this is the part I’m really not sure about, this and the bookplate. I kept that book for a long time, I don’t think I got rid of it until mum and I had to move houses a few years later, and I know I read it a lot of times without anything happening. But I think that first time I read the book, that first time I touched Miss Spider’s hand, something stuck to my fingers. I held it up to look closer, to see if someone had just spilled juice or something on the book before they sold it, but my fingers came away with something different. Little strings of web were stuck to the tips of my fingers and stretching back down to the page. There didn’t seem to be any spot for them to be coming from, but it was coming straight off the page from the drawing of Miss Spider’s hand. I pulled a bit, but after a few seconds the webs sort of shimmered and disappeared. My fingers still felt sticky and odd, kind of tingly, but...well, I had to finish the book.

The last page had all the flies again, and all the spiders, and Miss Spider in the center of them, all looking right at me. Not even just that they were looking out of the page, but I swear they were all looking directly at me and seeing me. They were smiling. “WELCOME TO THE PARTY!” the last page said, and I couldn’t help smiling too. I hadn’t gotten a lot of birthday party invites by that age, so I liked the idea of everyone welcoming me to a party. It was a really good book.

...God, this is all sounding a bit pathetic when I put it in words, isn’t it? What am I even talking about, a children’s book from over twenty years ago that had a few cobwebs stuck in it, and maybe, maybe had a bookplate that looked kind of like something I saw here? Jon, if you ever listen to this, I’m sorry for wasting this cassette and for wasting all this time. It’s not even like I still have the book or anything; like I said, it got sold to another secondhand shop when we moved. I wasn’t too keen to hold on to any presents from my dad just then. But I had it for those years and nothing weird happened. It was just a kind of creepy children’s book that made a big impression on me. So I guess that’s it. I don't imagine you would really care about this. 

Um...end statement.

_*click*_


End file.
